@Trent
"Most
spiritual systems practised by Africans, whether native or mainstream, are organized religions. The rituals of
Voodoo, Orisha, Serer, etc are all highly organized, and without exception, function in communal setting. They all have degrees of a priest class, ceremony, immolation, libation, religious holidays, creation stories, saints, divine systems of punishment and reward.
The key difference is most native or traditional faiths are usually ethno-specific and generally lack a written tradition, and a prophet. (
Awolalu)
They also are less proselytizing compared to Islam and Christianity.[1] Beyond this even Indigenous beliefs systems share elements in common with each other, as well as with
the Abrahamicfaiths and other indigenous belief systems around the world.
African spirituality is the spirituality of
African people, independent of the naming systems given to the cultures/rituals of those spiritual beliefs. African spirituality lives and is applied within of
Islam (e.g. Tijāniyyah), Judaism (e.g. Hebrew Israelite),
Christianity (e.g. Tewahedo) as much as it does inside of Vodon, or Odinani.
Outside of the Abrahamic faiths, and perhaps faiths found in the Diaspora, many African religions are inseparable from the ethnic identity and
culture. So the religion of the Serer is historically part of Serer identity, the religion of the Masaai is part of Masaai cultural identity.
One erroneous idea is that all Africans had one "pagan" religion at some point in time. There is no " original" religion for an entire continent of
people, which is static over 60,000 years of African history. Religion all over the world is invariable tied to lifestyle so as people move from nomadic to sedentary, from chiefdoms to city state, from hunters to agriculturist—religion evolved to suit. There is also a profound relationship to culture, and more often than not, cultures are not destroyed by new faiths but modified to accommodate the tenants of the new religion. We see this in Judaism, Christianity and Islam. The greater the cultural agency of the group, the more they Africanize the incoming faiths into their political-cultural domain.
AFRICA BEFORE SLAVERY | Africa's History did not Start in Slavery
Y'all in here snappin 
